Package including hanger for clothing



July 23, 1963 D. KASS PACKAGE INCLUDING HANGER FOR CLOTHING 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed March 2, 1962 INVENTOR.

I pay/0 mass BY t MM July 23, 1963 D. KAss PACKAGE INCLUDING HANGER FOR CLOTHING 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed March 2, 1962 FIG. 4

3,098,561 PACKAGE HQCLUDING HANGER FOR CLOTHWG David Kass, Kew Gardens, N.Y., assignor to Original Toy Corporation, Brooklyn, N.Y., a corporation of New York Filed Mar. 2, 1962, Ser. No. 177,011 19 Claims. (Cl. 206-4534) This invention relates to the packaging of clothes, particularly doll clothing, and includes an improved hanger for the same.

Doll clothes have been packaged by placing the same on a cardboard form which is stapled to a header. Sometimes the form has been shaped with arms like a hanger, and the hanger has been put in a plastic bag, with the parts all stapled together. As many as seven staples have been used, which had to be removed by the purchaser when taking the package apart.

In other cases the clothing has been placed on a plastic hanger which is combined with a header and a plastic bag. Here again staples are used to lock the parts together, and much the same disadvantages apply.

The general object of the present invention is to improve packaging of the described character. More particular objects are to eliminate the use of staples; to save time and labor in assembling the package; and to eliminate the need [for stapling machinery. Further objects are to provide a better and more attractive looking package with improved eye and sales appeal; to provide a package which is readily disassembled by the purchaser; and which may be reused by him if desired. This reuse may be of a part or all of the package. The elimination of staples avoids damage to the parts of the package, and also avoids possible injury to a child (or parent) opening the package, as well as to the clothing itself.

T o accomplish the foregoing general objects, and other more specific objects which will hereinafter appear, my invention resides in the package elements and their relation one to another, as are hereinafter more particularly described in the following specification. The specification is accompanied by drawings in which:

FIG. '1 is a perspective view of an assembled package embodying features of my invention;

FIG. 2 is a perspective view showing the parts of the package before assembly;

FIG. 3 is a vertical section drawn to enlarged scale and taken approximately in the plane of the line 3-3 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a fragmentary horizontal section taken ap proximately in the plane of the line 44 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a fragmentary horizontal section taken approximately in the plane of the line 5-5 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 is a front elevation of a hanger forming a main part of the package; and

FIG. 7 is a fragmentary enlarged section taken approximately in the plane of the line 7-7 of FIG. 6.

Referring to the drawing, and more particularly to FIG. 2, the package comprises three main parts, these being a hanger 12., a header 14, and a bag 16. After an article of doll clothing is applied to the arms of the hanger the parts are assembled as shown in FIG. 1, the middle portion of the hanger 12 being disposed inside the header 14-, and the latter being slid upward inside the bag 16.

Reverting to FIG. 2, the bag 16 is preferably trans- 3 ,098,551 Patented July 23, 1963 "ice parent. -It may be translucent or even opaque, but with a loss of display advantage. The bag is made of a suitable sheet plastics material such as polyethylene, cellophane, cellulose acetate, or other plastics material in thin sheet form. The material may be purchased in tubular form, in which case it is simply cut into short lengths, and one open edge is sealed from the corners toward the middle, as is indicated at 18 in FIG. 2. Usually heat scaling is employed, but other methods of closure are usable. The middle portion is left open, or, if the bag is bought from the bag manufacturer with one end already completely sealed, the middle portion may be slit below the seal to open the same, as indicated at 20. The lower end 22 is entirely open.

The header 1 4- is made of heavy paper or thin cardboard, but it could be made of other material having equivalent characteristics. The header here shown is a single sheet of material folded lengthwise, and slit in the middle as indicated at '24. It should be understood that this header is preliminarily printed with the name of the product, and any other desired advertising material, sales information, instructions for use, or the like.

The hanger 12 is preferably made of a stiff but somewhat flexible plastics material. This may be polyethylene, polystyrene, or other material which may be injection molded for high production rate at low cost. It com prises the usual hook Z6, and oppositely spread arms 28, but in addition has an intermediate portion 30 which may be called a header mount. This header mount includes an upper tab 32 which projects downward, and a lower tab 34 which projects upward. As is later explained these serve to anchor the header and the bag in position. The mount preferably is thinned at the parts 36- adjacent the tab 32, and at the parts 38 adjacent the tab 34, in order to facilitate bending with consequent angular displacement of the tabs. This expedites assembly of the package, as is later described.

Referring now to FIG. 6, the header 14 has a width in vertical direction which is slightly less than the spacing between the top of tab 32 and the bottom of tab 34. This permits the header to be located inside of and to be held by and between the tabs. Referring to FIG. 3, the top edge 40 of one side of the header is held within the tab 32, and similarly the bottom edge 42 of the other side of the header is held within the tab 34. The tab 32 is displaced toward the right, and the tab 34- is displaced toward the left. The header is anchored against movement relative to the hanger, without the use of staples.

Moreover, the transparent bag '16 may be anchored in position, and in FIG. 3 it will be seen that the top edge 44 of one side of bag 16 is caught beneath and held by the tab 32.

In the particular hanger here shown most of the parts are rounded in cross section. The hook portion is of double width, as though made of round parts coalesced in edge-to-edge relation, as shown at 26 in FIG. 3. The parts 36 and 38 (FIG. 7) are thinned by removal of about half the cross section of the material. Thus in FIG. 4 the parts 36 are convex downward, while in FIG. 5 the parts 38 are convex upward.

In FIG. 7 the part 36 has been thinned by removal of material from right to left, and the part 38 has been thinned by removal of material from left to right. In both cases the removal is in a direction transverse to the plane of the hanger. In FIG. 7 the upper and lower parts of the hanger arm 28 are shown in cross section at 46 and 48. The top member of the header mount is shown at 50. The tabs 32 and 34 are relatively thin. The part 52 is simply an ornament, better shown in FIGS. 2 and 6 of the drawing. In the present case it is heart shaped, with the figure of a seated baby inside the heart, but this ornament is not essential, and if one is used, it may differ in character.

Referring now to FIG. 3, because of the thinning of the material of the mount at 36 the hook portion at 26 is readily bent from the upright solid line position to the angular broken line position shown at 26, and in such case it pivots near the top part 50 of the mount. The tab 32 projects downward from and therefore turns with the part 50, and thus is displaced outwardly to the angular broken line position shown at 32. This greatly facilitates assembly of the hanger with the header because when the hook of the hanger is passed through the slot 24 in the top of the header, the hook is bent sideward and the top edge of one side of the header slides beneath the tab. A similar sideward bending of the lower tab 34 facilitates insertion of the lower edge of the opposite side of the header.

The garment is applied to the hanger after adding the header. The assembly of garment, hanger, and header is then slid through the open bottom of the transparent bag until the hook emerges through the slit in the top of the bag. The bending action may be repeated, that is, the hook may be bent sideward so that one top edge of the bag slides beneath the upper tab 32. j

The natural resilience of the plastics material causes the hanger to spring back to upright position, and the tabs then exert a continuing anchoring force on the materials caught beneath the same.

The hanger holds the sides of the header together. The header is nearly as long as the bag is wide, so that the bag also holds the sides of the header together, and the header supports the top of the bag.

The actual packaging procedure can be set up in several ways. One procedure is given below as an example, but is not intended to be in limitation of the invention.

The previously printed and slit paper header is folded in half, lengthwise, along a score line. The hanger is held face up, and passed through the die cut opening in the center top fold of the header, until the upper tab of the hanger is clear of the header. The hanger is then brought down with the top edge of the rear half of folded header slipping under upper tab, the latter being bent outward.

The front half of the folded header is now tucked under the lower tab of the hanger. The thinning at appropriate places to add flexibility and facilitate the accommodation of the header, makes these operations easy and fast.

The arms of the hanger are now slid into the garment being packaged. The hanger, header and garment are then slipped through the open end of the plastic garment bag until the hook of the hanger passes through the center opening in the closed end of the bag, and the top of the header reaches the closed end. The top edge at the rear side of the plastic bag is now tucked under the upper tab of the hanger. This prevents the hanger, header and garment from sliding back down thru the bag, and locks the entire package together.

Advantages of the new package to the clothing manufacturer are the saving in cost of staples because no staples are used; the saving in time and labor because no stapling operations are needed; the saving in machinery because there is no need for stapling machines; and the saving in space resulting from the elimination of the stapling machines. l

Moreover, the use of the new package avoids the possi- 'bility of lawsuits and liability damages caused by staple injury to children or parents. This is an advantage to the store as well as the manufacturer.

(The packaged product is superior because the elimination of the stapling operations does away with the rough handling that the item receives during a stapling process. The new package eliminates the need for the items to lie around waiting for the final stapling step. As a result, there is less chance for the items to become crushed under their own weight, and to ruin the careful pressing that each item receives. The end result is a cleaner, fresher looking garment having superior eye and buy appeal.

Advantages for the purchaser or consumer are convenience in that there are no staples to remove; safety because there is no chance of injury to parent or child or the garment by staples; and added value because the package is truly reuseable, in whole or in part, without staple holes and rips.

It is believed that the construction and method of use of my improved package, as well as the advantages thereof, will be apparent from the foregoing detailed description. It will also be apparent that while I have shown and described the invention in a preferred form, changes may be made without departing from the scope of the invention as sought to be defined in the following claims. In the claims the reference to a slit at the top of the bag applies to an incomplete seal, as well as a seal which is first complete and subsequently slit.

I claim:

1. A hanger for clothing, for use with a printed header of substantial dimension to be mounted edgewise above the clothing, said hanger being molded integrally out of a single body of a plastics molding material and comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount disposed above the arms and below the hook, said header mount having means to receive and hold the aforesaid header above the arms and below the hook.

2. A hanger for clothing, for use with a printed header of substantial dimension to be mounted edgewise above the clothing, said hanger being molded integrally out of a single body of a plastics molding material and comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount disposed above the arms and below the hook, said header mount having an upper tab projecting downward and having a lower tab projecting upward to receive the aforesaid header therebetween.

3. A hanger for clothing, for use with a printed header of substantial dimension to be mounted edgewise above the clothing, said hanger being molded integrally out of a single body of a plastics molding material and comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount between the arms and the hook, said header mount having generally horizontal top and bottom members and generally upright side members, an upper tab projecting downward from the top member, and a lower tab projecting upward from the bottom member, said tabs serving to receive and friction ally hold a header between said tabs and said upright side members.

4. A hanger for doll clothing, said hanger comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount between the arms and the hook, said header mount having generally horizontal top and bottom members and generally upright side members, an upper tab projecting downward from the top member, a lower tab projecting upward from the bottom member, the side members being thinned at their upper ends to facilitate angular displacement of the upper tab, and being thinned at their lower ends to facilitate angular displacement of the lower tab.

5. A hanger for doll clothing, said hanger comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount between the arms and the hook, said header mount having generally horizontal top and bottom members and generally upright side members, an upper tab projecting downward from the top member, a lower tab projecting upward from the bottom member, the side members being thinned at their upper ends to facilitate angular displacement of the upper tab, and being thinned at their lower ends to facilitate angular displacement of the lower tab, the upper ends being thinned in one direction transversely of the hanger, and the lower ends being thinned in opposite direction transversely of the hanger.

6. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 1 and a header, said header comprising a strip of paper folded longitudinally and slit at the center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit.

7. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 2 and a header, said header comprising a strip of stifi paper, the upper edge of the header being received within the upper tab, and the lower edge of the header being received within the lower tab.

8. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 3 and a header, said header comprising a strip of stiff paper, the upper edge of the header being received within the upper tab, and the lower edge of the header being received within the lower tab.

9-. A pack-age including a hanger as defined in claim 4 and a header, said header comprising a strip of stiff paper folded longitudinally and slit at the center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit, the upper edge of one side of the header being received within the upper tab, and the lower edge of the other side of the header being received within the lower tab.

10. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 5 and a header, said header comprising a strip of stiff paper folded longitudinally and slit at the center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit, the upper edge of one side of the header being received within the upper tab, and (the lower edge of the other side of the header being received within the lower tab.

1 1. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 1 and a header and a bag, said header comprising a strip of paper folded longitudinally and slit at the center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit, said bag being open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, and the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag.

12. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 2 and a header and :a bag, said header comprising a strip of paper, the upper edge of the header being received within the upper tab and the lower edge of the header being received within the lower tab, said hag being open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, and the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag.

13. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 3 and a header and a bag, said header comprising a strip of paper, the upper edge of the header being received within the upper tab and the lower edge of the header being received within the lower tab, said bag being open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and lat the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, and one edge at the slit of the bag being received beneath the upper tab of the hanger.

14. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 4, a header, and a bag, said header comprising a strip of paper folded longitudinally and slit at lthe center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit, the upper edge of one side of the header being received within the upper tab and the lower edge of the other side of the header being received Within the lower tab, said bag being made of a thin flexible transparent plastics material open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, and one edge of the slit of the bag being received beneath the upper tab of the hanger.

15. A package including a hanger as defined in claim 5, a header, and a bag, said header comprising a strip of paper folded longitudinally and slit art the center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit, the upper edge of one side of the header being received within the upper tab and the lower edge of the other side of the header being received within the lower tab, said bag being made of a thin flexible transparent plastics material open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, and one edge of the slit of the bag being received beneath the upper tab of the hanger.

16. A package for clothing, including a hanger and a bag, said hanger comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, a tab projecting down-ward below the hook, said bag being open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit in the center, the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, and one edge of the slit of the bag being received beneath the tab of the hanger.

17. A package for clothing, including a hanger and a bag, said hanger comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of clothing, a hook thereabove, a tab projecting downward below the hook, said bag being made of thin flexible transparent plastics material open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit in the center, the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, and one edge of the slit of the bag being received beneath the tab of the hanger.

18. A paclcage for doll clothing including a hanger, a header and a bag, said hanger comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of doll clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount disposed above the arms and below the hook, said header mount having means to receive and hold the aforesaid header above the arms and below the hook, said header comprising a strip of paper folded longitudinally and slit at the center part of the fold, the header mount of the hanger being received between the sides of the header with the hook projecting through the slit, said bag being open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and at the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, and the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, said bag being made of a thin flexible transparent sheet material.

19. A package for doll clothing including a hanger, a header, and a bag, said hanger comprising oppositely directed arms to receive an article of doll clothing, a hook thereabove, and a header mount disposed above the arms and below the hook, said header mount having an upper tab projecting downward and having a lower tab projecting upward to receive the aforesaid header therebetlween, said header being a strip of still paper with its upper edge received within the upper tab and with its lower edge received within the lower tab, said bag being open at the bottom and closed at the side edges and art the top edge except for a slit at the center, the header having a length approaching the width of the bag and being received inside the bag along the upper edge thereof, and the hook of the hanger passing through the slit at the top of the bag, said bag being made of a flexible transparent sheet material.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Cazier Feb. 12, 1907 Baker Aug. 7, 1934 Horton June 27, 1944 Bal'danza er a1. Jan. 1, 1946 Norensky Apr. 27, 1954 Goldband Aug. 7, 1956 FOREIGN PATENTS Germany Sept. 22, 1928 

16. A PACKAGE FOR CLOTHING, INCLUDING A HANGER AND A BAG, SAID HANGER COMPRISING OPPOSITELY DIRECTED ARMS TO RECEIVE AN ARTICLE OF CLOTHING, A HOOK THEREABOVE, A TAB PROJECTING DOWNWARD BELOW THE HOOK, SAID BAG BEING OPEN AT THE BOTTOM AND CLOSED AT THE SIDE EDGES AND AT THE TOP EDGE EXCEPT FOR A SLIT IN THE CENTER, THE HOOK OF THE HANGER PASSING THROUGH THE SLIT AT THE TOP OF THE BAG, AND ONE EDGE OF THE SLIT OF THE BAG BEING RECEIVED BENEATH THE TAB OF THE HANGER. 